University Of Madras

A self-taught genius Indian mathematician, Srinivasa Ramanujan is known for his contributions to mathematical analysis, number theory and continued fractions. Born into a humble family, the celebrated mathematician struggled with poverty but still managed to publish first of his papers in the Journal of the Indian Mathematical Society. Later, his collaboration with English mathematician G. H. Hardy proved very productive.

Viswanathan Anand is an Indian chess player and former world champion. The first grandmaster from India, Anand is also one of the few chess players to have gone past an Elo rating of 2800, only the fourth player in history to do so. Renowned for his quick moves, Anand is widely regarded as the greatest rapid player of our time.

Indra Nooyi is an Indian-American business executive known for her association with PepsiCo where she served as the chief executive officer from 2006 to 2018. Often ranked among the most powerful women, Nooyi was named in Forbes' World's 100 Most Powerful Women list in 2014. In 2017, she was named in the magazine's 19 Most Powerful Women in Business list.

Six-time National Award-winning Indian director Mani Ratnam was born to a film distributor father and left his consulting job to enter films in his younger days. Known for iconic films such as Roja, Bombay, and Guru, he specializes in topics related to socio-political issues and terrorism. He has also won a Padma Shri.

Mahesh Babu is one of the most popular and highest-paid South Indian film actors. He is also one of the most celebrated, decorated, and bankable actors of the Telugu film industry. A well-known philanthropist, Mahesh Babu donates 30 percent of his annual income to charity organizations. In 2013, he became the goodwill ambassador of a non-profit organization called Heal-a-child Foundation.

Bharat Ratna-winner C. Rajagopalachari, nicknamed Rajaji or C.R., was the last Governor-General of India and the first Indian to hold the post. He had also served as an INC leader, the Governor of West Bengal, and the Premier of the Madras Presidency. He launched the Swatantra Party and propagated peace.

Remembered for his varied contribution to astrophysics, Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar is perhaps best known for his work on the evolution of massive stars. Today known as Chandrasekhar limit, it contributed to final understanding of supernovas, neutron stars, and black holes. A prolific writer, he also did significant work on energy transfer by radiation in stellar atmospheres and convection on solar surface.

Ramon Magsaysay Award-winning geneticist M. S. Swaminathan is best known for his contribution to the Indian Green Revolution. Featured on Time, he introduced high-yielding varieties of wheat and rice seedlings to Indian farmers. He is also known for his administrative work as part of the Indian civil services.

Ramaswamy Venkataraman was an Indian independence activist, lawyer, and politician. He served as the eighth president of the country from 1987 to 1992. His five-year term as the president witnessed the emergence of coalition politics in India. Prior to becoming the President, he also served as the Union Finance Minister and Defence Minister.

Chinmayi Sripada is an Indian singer, voice actor, radio jockey, and TV presenter who works predominantly in the South Indian film and TV industry. Chinmayi is also credited with founding Blue Elephant, a translation services company, for which she serves as the CEO. Also known for her activism, Chinmayi Sripada has been an important figure in India's Me Too movement.

Vijay Amritraj is an Indian sports commentator and former professional tennis player. He is best known for his contribution as a tennis commentator in major Grand Slam events, such as Wimbledon. Also known for his humanitarian efforts, Vijay Amritraj is credited with establishing The Vijay Amritraj Foundation which aims at fighting the spread of AIDS.

Raja Ramanna was an Indian nuclear physicist, remembered for his role in the development of India’s nuclear weapons program. Beginning his career under Homi Bhabha, he eventually served as the director of Bhabha Atomic Research Centre, overseeing India’s first nuclear weapons test in 1974.  Meanwhile he also served as the secretary for defense research and later headed Atomic Energy Commission.

S. R. Ranganathan was an Indian librarian and mathematician. Ranganathan is best remembered for developing the colon classification, a system of library classification, which is currently used in research libraries all over the world. In India, he is considered the father of library science, information science, and documentation. His birthday is observed as National Librarian's Day in his home country.

Padma Vibhushan winner and nine-time Nobel Prize nominee theoretical physicist E. C. George Sudarshan was born in India but moved to the U.S. to study at the University of Rochester. He later joined Harvard and made ground-breaking discoveries in topics such as quantum optics, tachyons, and the quantum Zeno effect.

Part of the Kasturi family that manages The Hindu Group, N. Ram has been the MD of the group in the past. The Padma Bhushan awardee has also penned books such as Riding the Nuclear Tiger and has previously represented Tamil Nadu, his home state, in the Ranji Trophy cricket matches.

Indian civil servant and jurist B. N. Rau was one of the persons behind the drafting of the constitutions of India and Burma. He also served as a judge of the Bengal High Court and the Court of International Justice. He was also the Indian representative to the UN and was eventually knighted.

G. N. Ramachandran was an Indian physicist. His creation of the Ramachandran plot to better understand peptide structure has been playing a significant role in the field of protein conformation. He is also credited with founding the Molecular Biophysics Unit which is currently situated at the Indian Institute of Science (IISc). 

Raj Reddy is an Indian-American computer scientist. One of the pioneers of Artificial Intelligence (AI), Reddy was honored with the prestigious Turing Award in 1994 for his contribution to the field of artificial intelligence. He is the first computer scientist of Asian descent to win the award, which is often referred to as the Nobel Prize of Computer Science.

Kamala Markandaya, also known as Kamala Taylor after her marriage, was one of the most significant Indian writers of English. Known for novels such as Nectar in a Sieve and A Silence of Desire, she was known to portray Western ideals as materialistic. She moved to England after India’s independence.

S. R. Srinivasa Varadhan is an Indian American mathematician whose contributions to probability theory have earned him several prestigious awards including the National Medal of Science in 2010. He is also renowned for coming up with a unified theory of large deviations. He is currently serving as a professor at the Courant Institute.